Monday, August 1, 2016

I am very excited to have my first novel published online! Love Affairs: Tales of Love, Romance, and Passion is available
for purchase for only $0.99 (or less) at Smashwords as well as at a number of retailers,
including iBooks!

If you have an extra buck stashed somewhere or feel like taking me out for a virtual
coffee, this could be a great way to spend your money!

If you are the cautious or hesitant type, you
can download the first quarter of the book for
free and then see, reflect, and decide if you'd like to purchase it, after
all. Either way I fully appreciate your interest!

The only caveat is that you need to be 18 or
older. Why, you may ask. Well, I think I would need to first introduce to you
my French friend and alter ego Marcel Legrand.

Marcel is the protagonist of the novel; he is a
philosophical womanizer / romantic poet whose self-proclaimed nickname is machine d’amour! He talks candidly - with
a grain of salt and handful of humor - about his romantic conquests and
endeavors. There are four main leading ladies he tries to seduce at different
intervals, in addition to a couple of one-night stands thrown in, here and
there, for good measure.

Although there is some sex involved, the prudish
need not turn away necessarily. There's hardly any graphic or hardcore content
here as this is

more about romance and poetry and it is not erotica per se.
When there is some "action" going on, it is dealt with a light touch and it is
quite funny actually.

An example is when his cute neighbour asks him if he has a monkey wrench,
and Marcel ends up fixing her leaky faucet. She then proceeds to strip for him as
a form of recompense (I suppose) and he notices that his “elevator” has reached
the “penthouse.” Humorous? Enticing? Both? Why not?

If you generally like Arash's World, you should enjoy this Frenchman’s random
philosophical excursions and existential speculations and most likely be amused
with some of his admittedly bizarre views on life and romance. His tales are
semi-autobiographical, meaning exactly what it means: Half of the information
is absolutely true, while the other half are just blatant lies.

What can I say about his style? Well, if you put
Shakespeare and Benny Hill in the blender, this work will be the end result. Or
rather expect more Benny and less Will in the mixture. Or take a male character of every French film
you have ever seen, mash them up, and you will have a sketch of Marcel Legrand.

About 14 years ago I self-published a shorter
version of Love Affairs. This was in
the forgotten dark era before the existence of blogs and e-books. I say “self-publish”
but actually am talking about a bunch of photocopies stapled together and given
away for free to friends, acquaintances, and beautiful strangers on the bus.

It was actually a great success back then, all
things considered. My friends liked what they read and tried to speculate who I
had or had not bedded in the process of writing this short novel! As if this
was a research project. Fun times indeed!

But I felt about my work the same way I feel
about poetry: The main purpose is to get girls ... I mean their attention, of
course. In fact, my main inspiration for writing it came from Truffaut’s brilliant film The Man Who Loved Women (1977) although I have
to confess that I find my own protagonist somewhat more charming and endearing
overall. But the general outline of both works is about the same.

Anyhow, over the years I have come to miss Marcel, this affectionate and
crazy French guy. I know he is fictitious but somehow I feel a close affinity
with him and decided to bring him back to life for a hopefully larger audience this
time around.

This is why I have put together a more definitive version as my
e-book here; in fact, I am planning to write a sequel that depicts Marcel fifteen
years later, which is hopefully to be released sometime in the next year! Please
stay tuned for that!

I also want to heartily thank Smashwords for their platform and
support and their genuine and admirable desire to help indie writers like me! They
are professional and resourceful and, most importantly for me, they are
well-organized!

Hope you enjoy what you read and feel free to leave me comments and reviews at your retailer of choice! And again, thank you, from both Marcel and
me!

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Goodreads

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I was quite interested in learning about the differences between the psychoanalytic treat...

Each / either field (Zen Buddhism / Psychoanalysis) is fascinating on its own terms but one day I felt that they were intimately and intricately connected and that turns out to be true! Although the book as a brief and general survey mer...